Sacai

Wikipedia says Sacai was founded in 1999 by Chitose Abe, born Chitose Sakai, and is headquartered in Tokyo. Yokogao says Abe started it as a small side business with support from her husband Junichi Abe, founder of kolor, and that the name comes from her maiden name, Sakai. It says she ran the label from home for over three years.

Yokogao says Abe worked as a pattern maker at Comme des Garcons for eight years, without giving dates. Abe is quoted there saying, "I wasn't planning long term. I was just being a mom and raising a child with the need to create something". Yokogao says the first retailer was Beams and that Abe opened sacai's first office in Daikanyama, Tokyo, in 2003.

Wikipedia lists the company type as private and names no owners or investors. We did not find another source that says who owns Sacai.

Yokogao describes the brand's core idea as the fusion of garments or fabrics to create something truly new. Fashionography says hybridity is central to Sacai's design philosophy, juxtaposing diverse fabric textures to create unexpected garment forms.

In a Time Out Hong Kong interview published on 10 January 2017, Abe said, "we applied Sacai's hybrid aesthetic of 'all-in-one' looks". In the same piece she said, "It has to be wearable," and "It's not an art piece. It may look like one but it's not". Wikipedia says Vogue credits Sacai with breaking down the dichotomy between casual and formal clothing.

Wikipedia gives a 2016 to 2022 span of collaborations with Sophie Bille Brahe, The North Face, Beats Electronics, Apple, A.P.C., Nike and Dior, without a year for each partner. The official store also names sacai x Smythson and sacai x A.P.C..

The sacai Official Store at sacai.jp is an online store with a region selector set to Japan (yen), Japanese and English language options and a store locator. Its Men, Women and ANYBODY sections list categories including clothing, bags, accessories and shoes. The page we opened did not show item prices in its text, so we have no current price for sacai's own line.

Snobette reported in a 7 May 2019 article, ahead of launch, that the Nike sacai LDWaffle was priced at $180, with a launch on nike.com on 30 May 2019, and the Blazer Mid at $140 for the same day on Nike's SNKRS app. These are collaboration prices from 2019, not a guide to sacai's main line.